


A Mouse's Hangover

by AParticularlyLargeBear



Series: Shadowrun College [5]
Category: Shadowrun
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, Hangover
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-10-18
Updated: 2015-10-18
Packaged: 2018-04-27 00:04:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,546
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5025892
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AParticularlyLargeBear/pseuds/AParticularlyLargeBear
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Jenny isn't sure what happened last night, nor how she wound up sleeping on a stranger's couch, but maybe she can make some friends out of it. </p><p>Follows from A Mouse's Courage</p>
            </blockquote>





	A Mouse's Hangover

One moment, vague, dark, and strange dreams. The next, wide awake, morning light creeping through a crack in the curtains. Jenny blinked once, twice. She was… lying down. On a couch. Slight headache, standard hangover from a night out. Sore back, presumably from cramming her frame onto a couch not built for a troll.

Wait, hold on. Whose couch was this?

Jenny sat bolt upright then wished she hadn’t as the sudden motion caused a sick wave of vertigo to crash across her. The room swung dizzingly away, and her stomach lurched, churning bile which rose into the back of her throat. Oh shit, oh fuck, this hangover was much worse than she’d thought.

“Morning,” the voice was quiet, and it took Jenny a second to place it. Wait, she remembered – the girl from last night, Glory. Sure enough, a pale figure slipped into view, leaning over slightly to inspect Jenny. “Sorry. After your friend ran off last night, I didn’t know where to take you, and you weren’t in any condition to give directions,” a shrug. “My place was nearby.”

Jenny nodded slowly. That made sense, though the explanation sent a pang of guilt through her. Duncan…

“Thanks for looking out for me. I do stupid shit when I’m drunk. Like pick terrible moments to tell my brother secrets.”

“Probably isn’t a _good_ moment to tell someone something like that.”

“Maybe,” Jenny knuckled her forehead, as if that would excise the dull throbbing that was permeating her skull. “But not right after I had a fight with my dad.”

“Ah. Sorry,” Glory didn’t _sound_ sympathetic, but Jenny was beginning to wonder if the stoic girl mustered much of an emotional response to anything.

“Gooood morning Vietnam!”

The voice was far, far too exuberant for this level of hangover at this hour of the … well, Jenny assumed it was morning anyway. It felt like it.

A chipper-looking woman with a purple streak in her spiky blonde hair strolled into the lounge, smiling, hands stuffed into the pockets of a bright pink dressing gown. When she spotted Jenny on the sofa, her eyes lit up.

“Sleeping beauty awakens! How you feeling?”

Taken aback, it took Jenny a second to respond. “Been worse.”

“Good. You were pretty dead to the world when Ace and me got in last night.”

“You mean this morning,” said Glory.

“Pff. You got me,” there was an idle half salute, stopping just short of being mocking. “I’m Monika Schäfer, don’t think I’ve seen you around before.”

“Jenny. Zhang. I’m in my first year.”

“Really? I mean, not that I’m doubting you, but you don’t usually get frosh in Club 88. Tends to take a while to figure out it’s worth the effort of getting past Freddy.”

Jenny smiled. Well that wasn’t a new one. Freddy always had good intentions, but that included keeping the rabble out of the family club. A lot of students qualified as rabble. “I’m local,” she explained. “Me and Freddy go back a ways.”

“Aaaah,” Monika nodded. “Well, feel free to chill for a bit, grab a coffee. Or a soykaf, if you’re into that. I always like getting to know new people.”

“You can’t adopt her, Monika.”

“Watch me.”

“Uhh…” Jenny looked between the two of them, feeling as though she’d missed something.

Glory shrugged. Some manner of indifference appeared to be her default emotion. “Monika has a habit of mothering new arrivals, whether they like it or not.”

“So cruel, Glory. Everyone likes me.”

There was a grumbling from one of the lounge’s entrances that didn’t contain any actual words, but appeared to convey a generally negative sentiment to Monika’s statement. Jenny glanced away from Monika and found herself looking at a dark-haired elf, swathed in a blanket and scowling to boot.

“Oh, morning Ace! Good to see you up,” Monika chirped, a twinkle in her eye.

The elf produced her middle finger.

“That’s Julia,” supplied Glory. “Or Cub, I guess.”

“That’s three names in three sentences,” Jenny muttered.

“Just call me Cub.”

“She’s kind of a hippy,” said Monika. “Really into the whole shamanism and spirituality thing,” stepping over, Monika leaned down to plant a kiss on Cub’s forehead. “It’s real cute.”

“Yeah yeah, whatever,” she started to smile, but it was hidden by an enormous yawn.

“Also very not a morning person,” Monika added. “She didn’t even drink last night.”

“I didn’t get to sleep until like four am,” Cub complained, before turning an eye to Jenny. “Sorry if my girlfriend has said or done anything stupid. “

“Hey!”

“Monika, you should come with a warning label. Seriously,” Cub yawned again, mouth gaping wide. “Anyhow, I’m going to go drown myself in soykaf. Good meeting you,” she slowly meandered her way across the room and into an attached kitchen area. After few moments, the hissing of a boiling kettle began.

Monika took the opportunity to sprawl out on a lounge chair like an oversized cat. Glory sat down next to Jenny – although ‘next to’ only counted in so much that they were sitting on the same piece of furniture. Perched on the edge, Glory was about as far away as she could possibly be. Something Jenny had said?

“You talk in your sleep, you know.”

…Shit. Maybe it _was._

“Yeah? Anything embarrassing?” Jenny tried to sound casual, wasn’t quite sure whether or not she played it off properly.

“No idea. Wasn’t English.”

That actually kind of made sense. Jenny had been preoccupied about her family, and though she didn’t properly recall what she’d been dreaming about, she had the faint impression that Ray and Duncan were involved.

“Would have been Cantonese then.”

Glory nodded. Monika tilted her head to the side. “Your accent’s pretty solidly American.”

Jenny hesitated briefly before explaining. “I learned Cantonese from my foster father,” another hesitation, then she pressed on. “Duncan and I weren’t allowed to speak anything else at home.”

“Sounds like kind of a hardass,” Cub again, emerging from the kitchen area with an enormous coffee mug clutched in her hands. “If you don’t mind me saying.”

“He is. I owe him a lot. But he really is,” her mind drifted back to last night, and she withheld a wince. Getting into arguments with Ray… not great.

“Hey, Ace. You’re Asian. You speak Cantonese?” Monika had a wicked grin on her face.

“I’m _Thai,_ you fuck,” Cub growled, wrapping her blanket tighter around her shoulders and shuffling out of the room. Jenny blinked. What?

Monika chuckled.

“Monika…” Glory muttered.

“What? Oh come on, you know I’m only…” Monika trailed off, rubbed awkwardly at her head. “Uh… just so we’re clear that was an in-joke. I don’t actually think that Asian people are all the same – shit that sounds even worse!”

“Hole. Digging it.” Glory said, monotone.

Jenny eyed Monika dubiously. Duncan and her had been on the wrong end of plenty of folks who’d felt the need to kick them when they were down, who’d wanted to tear them down for who they were as well as their circumstances. Wasn’t easy for a pair of goblinoid kids to fend for themselves, and their shared ethnicity had been just another bit of petty ammunition.

Made it difficult for her to give someone new the benefit of the doubt.

Monika’s shoulders slumped. “Hooo boy… can we start over?” Jenny inclined her head, very slightly. “Ace and me – we make fun of each other all the time. And I don’t exactly have much of a filter in the first place.”

“I can vouch for that,” added Glory.

There was an awkward silence. Monika shifted in her seat. “So I didn’t get much from Glory, but you had a fight with a friend?”

Jenny sighed. Seemed she wasn’t going to get to just forget about this. “I told my brother something I’d been keeping from him.”

Monika made a sympathetic noise. “Secrets… always awkward.”

“I shouldn’t have told him,” Jenny said bitterly. “Oh hey, Duncan turns out that me going to juvy for a year and a half didn’t even need to happen! Sorry about getting arrested and leaving you and all.”

Monika straightened up all of a sudden. “Got screwed by the system, huh?” she shook her head. “It’s all corrupt. We should tear it down and start over.”

Jenny stared at her. “Um.”

Glory rolled her eyes. “Monika’s an anarchist.”

“Hell yeah I am.”

Jenny continued staring. She supposed Ray always said that she’d meet some interesting people at college. “But aren’t you … you know… in the system here?”

Monika shrugged. “I'm just here for the experience. And the connections.”

“And Cub,” murmured Glory. Monika laughed, loud and lively.

“True that.”

Glory looked back to Jenny. “To change the subject from Monika politics, I was planning on heading to the coffee shop this morning, proof read some pages. Might be the thing for that hangover before you head home.”

Jenny nodded, suppressing a wince as the motion once again rattled her headache. “Sounds good to me. Thanks again for looking after me.”

“You’re still thanking me after I subjected you to Monika?”

“Hey!”

Jenny smiled, feeling at least a little better for the company. Against the odds something good had come out of yesterday. Maybe it'd be worth the rest of it.


End file.
